Prosecute web giants for abuse

Tony Jaffa, Head of Media at Foot Anstey comments in The Times abouta new law that could treat social media companies as publishers and therefore face fines or prosecution for failing to remove racist, extremist or child sex abuse content.

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Tony Jaffa, a partner at the law firm Foot Anstey, said that the move could lead to technology giants facing civil or criminal action. “This goes to the issue at the heart of the debate that technology companies say they are platforms and not publishers so they cannot be held responsible for what their users do. Others say they are most definitely a publisher and provide the platform just as conventional publishers do,” he said.